Joseph Rebell · Southern Lights
From 15 June to 13 November 2022, the Belvedere in Vienna is presenting an exhibition dedicated to the work of Joseph Rebell (1787-1828), the Austrian landscape painter fascinated by the light and landscape of Italy.
Source: Belvedere, Vienna · Image: Joseph Rebell, "Sunset over the Campi Flegrei in front of the islands of Procida and Ischia" (detail), 1819. Belvedere, Vienna.
Born in Vienna in 1787, Joseph Rebell travelled to Switzerland in 1809, from where he arrived in Italy, a country that fascinated him with its light and landscapes, and for years he travelled around the country, visiting Milan, Rome and Naples, creating landscape paintings that achieved almost immediate success. The exhibition -the first that the Belvedere has dedicated to the artist, and curated by Sabine Grabner- includes some 70 paintings and 40 drawings by Rebell, including several loans from public and private collections in Austria, Germany, Italy and Switzerland.
According to the Belvedere, Rebell's works “are marked by a preoccupation with light that sets them apart from those of his contemporaries. The warm rays of the Italian sun illuminate his landscapes; this is what gave the vistas of the Gulf of Naples, the Amalfi coast, and the islands of Capri and Ischia their particularly realistic and natural appearance. Rebell's paintings were held in high esteem by art lovers across Europe, among them a number of aristocrats and kings. While in Rome in 1819, Emperor Franz I noticed the modernity of Rebell's works and immediately commissioned him to paint four large-scale views of the Naplesregion – these paintings are now in the Belvedere. Soon after, he appointed the painter as director of the Imperial Picture Gallery in the Upper Belvedere. From 1824 until his sudden death in December 1828, Rebell used his innovative energy to transform the gallery from a summer palace into a modern museum.”

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